Johann Klemm (composer)

Johann Klemm (also Klemme , Klemmius ; * around 1595 in Oederan , † around 1659 probably in Dresden ) was a German composer , organist and music publisher .

life and work

Johann Klemm joined the Dresden court orchestra as a choirboy in 1605 and was employed as an instrumentalist in 1612. In 1613 he was sent to Augsburg to study with the well-known organist Christian Erbach , with Elector Johann Georg I taking over the costs. In 1616 or 1617, Klemm returned to Dresden and continued his musical studies with Heinrich Schütz . In 1625 he was appointed court organist. His tasks there included the musical training of the choirboys, a. a. was Matthias Weckmann his organ students.

Good relationships between Schütz and Klemm are not only documented by letters that have been preserved, but also by the fact that Klemm became the publisher of important works by Schütz (his Symphoniae Sacrae II, 1647 and Sacred Choral Music , 1648). He initially carried out his publishing activities together with the Leipzig organist Daniel Weixer , and later in Bautzen with Alexander Hering . Klemm is recorded as a participating musician at the funeral ceremonies for Johann Georg I in 1657, and he probably died in Dresden in 1659.

To Klemm few compositions obtained by counting each 12 Church tones ordered 2-, 3- u. 4-part fugues in Partitura seu Tabulatura Italica for organ or other instruments (Dresden, 1631). In these, the replacement of the alphabetical tablature that was still common in Germany at that time by the Italian notation form as a score is propagated.

literature

• John O. Robison (Ed.): Johann Klemm. Partitura seu Tabulatura italica . Recent Researches in the Music of the Baroque Era, 92. Madison (Wisconsin), A – R Editions, 1998
• The New Grove, 2nd edition
• Blume, Friedrich (Ed.): Music in the past and present , 1st edition, 1949–1986